Senior Product Owner

Position: Senior Product Owner

Rate: $65 C2C

Onsite Washington DC

Duration: Long term ongoing

Visa: USC only

The interview will be conducted in person.

Local DMV Only

BACKGROUND 

The Senior Product Owner (specifically Technical Product Owner) will define product vision and priorities for a research-collaboration tooling initiative, translating business and researchcollaboration needs into clear technical requirements and an actionable roadmap. This position partners closely with DevSecOps engineering and platform leads to keep this initiative's roadmap aligned with broader platform priorities. The ideal candidate is both product-ownership fluent and technically literate, with enough platform-level knowledge of source-control, technical authoring, and file-collaboration tools to evaluate feasibility, ask informed questions of technical SMEs, and make informed technology decisions grounded in what the underlying platforms can actually do.

Knowledge/Skill Requirements

• Bachelor's degree in a related field, or equivalent experience.

• 10 years of experience in product ownership, technical business analysis, or a related

role, ideally in a platform, tooling, or developer-collaboration context.

• Proven track record defining product vision and translating business/stakeholder needs

into technical specifications and user stories.

• Experience working directly with business analysts, senior leadership, and engineers or

architects to validate feasibility and make technology decisions.

• Working knowledge of source-control/developer-collaboration platforms (e.g., GitHub),

technical authoring and research-collaboration platforms (e.g., Overleaf), and filecollaboration/ research-sharing platforms.

• Strong written and verbal communication skills; proven ability to translate between

technical and non-technical audiences.

• Hands-on experience with AI-assisted development tools (e.g., GitHub Copilot, Claude

Code, Cursor) preferred.

• Ability to manage competing priorities across multiple stakeholders.

• Certified Scrum Product Owner (CSPO), Professional Scrum Product Owner (PSPO),

SAFe Product Owner/Product Manager (POPM), or equivalent.

• Experience supporting a research-collaboration, academic-partnership, or externalstakeholder engagement effort.

• Familiarity with Agile delivery practices (Scrum/Kanban).

• Federal government experience is a plus 

• Experience in a DevSecOps or platform engineering environment

The candidate shall possess the knowledge and skills set forth in the Technical Services BOA, Section 3.2.3.2 for labor category Senior Product Owner. The candidate shall also demonstrate the knowledge and experience below:

Product Vision & Requirements Definition

• Define product vision and priorities for research-collaboration tooling and technologies,

elicited and validated directly with business stakeholders, architects, and technical SMEs.

• Convert business and research-collaboration needs into clear, actionable technical

specifications and user stories.

• Prioritize features and enhancements based on both business value and technical

feasibility.

• Maintain requirements traceability from business need through to technical delivery.

Platform & Technical Awareness

• Maintain working knowledge of the platforms relevant to external research collaboration

– source-control/developer platforms, technical authoring and research-collaboration

platforms, and file-collaboration/research-sharing platforms, sufficient to assess

integration options and flag technical constraints early.

• Partner with engineering and platform architects to evaluate feasibility and integration

approaches (e.g., authoring-platform-to-source-control sync, repository/access models for

external collaborators) before decisions are finalized.

• Stay current on the research-collaboration tooling landscape as it evolves and re-scope

the roadmap accordingly.

Technical Leadership

• Evaluate architectural decisions and technical tradeoffs with engineering and platform

architects.

• Assess scalability and performance implications of product and tooling choices.

• Make informed decisions on technology stack and integration approaches (e.g.,

authoring-platform-to-source-control sync, repository/access models for external

collaborators).

Cross-Functional Communication

• Serve as the primary translator between business stakeholders and DevSecOps

engineering and platform leads.

• Communicate technical constraints, tradeoffs, and timelines to non-technical stakeholders

in plain language.

• Communicate business priorities and external-collaborator needs to the engineering

teams in actionable terms.

Process & Delivery Support

• Apply fundamentals of project management, organization, and process mapping to keep

product and requirements work on track.

• Maintain clear documentation of decisions, open questions, and requirement changes

(e.g., meeting minutes, decision logs).

• Support planning and prioritization discussions with program leadership.